Working "off-line" in distributed teams

[jb]

I am after some general advice on the best practises for working with EA projects on distributed teams.  Specifically we would like to use the concept of working "off-line" from the central DBMS repository.

Our set-up is as follows:
- Central EA repository in SQL Server (one database per client project) - hosted in our Atlanta, US datacentre LAN
- SVN Repository (all project using version control) - hosted in London, UK LAN
- Users working with EA on their own LAN in UK, India and Spain
- Each LAN is connected via the same WAN
- WAN Optimizer installed on the SQL Server PC on the Atlanta LAN and all user access the repository via the WAN Optimizer

Even with the WAN Optimizer connectivity can be slow.  Also some users do work disconnect from their LAN on occassion.

Therefore what is the best approach we could take for allowing users to work "off-line" from the SQL Server repository?  

Thanks

JB

[Dieter Goetz]

You can use the replica feature.
There is one master-replica file on your server. All users can generate a local replica file and working on this.
The local replicas and the master replica can be synchronized.

GoDie

[Geert Bellekens]

Whatever you do, DON'T use the master/replica feature!

What you can do is keep multiple copies of your EA repositories in each location, as long as you keep them all version controlled in the same central SVN repository.

The downside to this ways of working compared to your current mode is that you only see the changes after you do a "get latest" (I would schedule a daily "Get All Latest" batch to run at night if I were you)

Geert

[Dermot]

An alternate optin to Replication and Version Control is the Baseline Difference and Merge. You can use this to merge Package-trees between seperate repositories. Both repositories need to be from the same source with updated data. For more detail see: http://www.sparxsystems.com/enterprise_architect_user_guide/9.0/projects_and_teams/differences.html

Like Version Control it is not dependant on the repositories being of the same type (you can transfer from .eap to DBMS).